A Democratic Socialist Blog

The Obama Care Disaster

Obama Care is the most dangerous and worse domestic policy disaster in US History. The refusal for Single Payer and initiatives that would help us, actually prove that the war on the people is initiated on many fronts. That is why The Sanders and Socialist revolutions is so important to us.

Turnout in Tuesday’s gubernatorial election was simply dreadful. According to the state’s chief elections officer, preliminary results show that only 30.7 percent of voters actually cast a ballot in this off-off-year election. That compares with 45.9 percent of voters in 2014 — a midterm election that featured the lowest turnout rate since World War II— and 59.4 percent of voters during the 2012 presidential race.

It is likely, moreover, that 2015’s poor turnout will have a massive impact on many Kentuckians’ lives. Indeed, it is likely that many low-income Kentucky residents will literally die because so few people cast a ballot in the state’s gubernatorial race.

On the eve of the election, Real Clear Politics’s polling average of the Kentucky governor’s race showed Democrat Jack Conway leading Republican Matt Bevin by more than five points. Yet, with most of the state sitting out this election, Bevin instead defeated Conway 53-44.

Conway was widely expected to continue incumbent Gov. Steve Beshear’s (D-KY) successful implementation of the Affordable Care Act, which helped over half-a-million Kentuckians obtain health coverage in its first year. Bevin, by contrast, is a staunch opponent of Obamacare who has promised to shut down the state-run health care exchange. Last February, when asked about the law’s Medicaid expansion, Bevin responded unequivocally Absolutely. No question about it. I would reverse that immediately.”

An estimated 400,000 people will lose their health care if Bevin follows through on this statement.

Kentucky has not yet released data showing turnout rates broken down by party, although they typically do so at some point after the election. As a general rule, however, low turnout is a Republican’s best friend. Voters who are financially secure and who have firmly settled in a community aremore likely to vote than others who are more transient and have less financial certainty. That means that groups which tend to prefer Republicans — older voters, white voters, wealthy voters — tend to turn out at higher rates than younger voters, lower income voters and voters of color — all of whom are more likely to prefer Democrats.As the Obamacare open enrollment period begins, it’s the end for many healthcare co-ops, leaving hundreds of thousands of people scrambling to find coverage. The co-ops were founded to offer a cheaper alternative on insurance exchanges after Democrats stopped demanding a public option. But since going live three years ago, the co-ops have faced major cutbacks from the Republican-controlled Congress. Now the system is faltering, with at least eight health insurance co-ops shutting down. The co-op closures have left some 500,000 people without insurance—and a marketplace of fewer choices and higher prices. It’s the kind of scenario that advocates of a single-payer system warned about from the outset: With Obamacare relying on for-profit insurance companies to provide coverage, the market will find a way to squeeze out those who need it most. We are joined by three guests: physician, professor and single-payer advocate Dr. Steffie Woolhandler; Wendell Potter, a former insurance executive turned whistleblower; and Julia Hutchins, chief executive officer of Colorado HealthOP, a consumer-directed, nonprofit health cooperative in Colorado that was forced to shut down last month. 500,000 people will be out of access to healthcare.

Why do people remain uninsured?

Even under the ACA, many uninsured people cite the high cost of insurance as the main reason they lack coverage. In 2014, 48% of uninsured adults said the main reason they were uninsured was because the cost was too high. Many people do not have access to coverage through a job, and some people, particularly poor adults in states that did not expand Medicaid, remain ineligible for public coverage. In addition, undocumented immigrants are ineligible for Medicaid or Marketplace coverage.

Who are the remaining uninsured?

Most uninsured people are in low-income working families. In 2014, over 8 in 10 were in a family with a worker, and over 5 in 10 have family income below 200% of poverty. Reflecting the more limited availability of public coverage in some states, adults are more likely to be uninsured than children.

With the war on the people 24/7 on all social issues in the USA, we need Sanders and his congresional candidates more than ever.